What is an empire? Definitions, examples

What is an empire? The Akkadian Empire: Stele of Naram-Sin (about 2200 BC)

Definition of an empire

What is an empire? An empire is like a state, only with one more layer of government. States generally have at least four levels of administration; empires have five. For example, in a state, you might have (1) a town council (2) a count (3) a duke and (4) a king. But in an empire, you might have a governor instead of a king, and then an emperor over everyone else.

States join together to make an empire

An empire is generally made up of a lot of states joined together. Sometimes these states are still mostly independent, sometimes they are totally part of the empire. The usual pattern of empires is that one state, for whatever reason, becomes stronger than its neighbors and conquers them, creating an empire. The more it conquers, the stronger it gets, and so it conquers more and more of its neighbors. (There’s also the victorious army problem).

Why does an empire stop growing?

Eventually the empire stops growing. Sometimes that’s because it hits an ocean or a mountain range that is hard to cross. Or sometimes an empire meets neighbors who are stronger than it is. But more often it’s just because it is inconvenient to fight so far from home.

Why do empires collapse into smaller states?

After some time, the empire weakens and breaks up into smaller states again. There’s really no need to explain why. It’s hard to hold an empire together, and any little problem can make it fall apart. Often, the empire hires weaker people living outside the empire as mercenaries, and then they end up invading or taking over. Sometimes they have to fight wars on two different borders at the same time, and they can’t afford it. Sometimes there’s a plague or a drought. Often the death of a leader leads to civil war. Sometimes there’s great inequality – a few very rich people and mostly very poor people – and that weakens the empire because very few people go to school, so they can’t invent things or organize things very well. Neighboring empires that have been more equal send more kids to school and develop better technology. Then they use their strength to attack unequal empires.

The Hittites also had a small empire. These empires were mainly tribute-collectors. They did not try very hard to control the activities of the states under their control.

The Persian Empire

The Persian Empire in 539 BC, in Iran, was different from any empire before it. It was more centrally controlled, thanks to good roads and a good messenger service. Like most later empires, the Persian Empire brought peace and safety. But some people who wanted to rule themselves were forced into the empire. The peace and safety of the Persian Empire and the Zhou Dynasty in China allowed increasing trade between them along the Silk Road.

Islamic Empire and Mongols

The Islamic Empire, like other West Asian empires before it, has a pattern of unifying and collapsing which has lasted from then until now. In Europe, no medieval power after Charlemagne succeeded in building a successor to the Roman Empire, though many Holy Roman Emperors tried. The Aztecs and Incas in the Americas built smaller empires. But in the later Middle Ages, almost all of Eurasia – from Eastern Europe to China – was unified in one gigantic empire under Genghis Khan and the Mongols.

The U.S.S.R., the United States, and China

But after the World Wars, these empires also broke up. In the 1900s, the world’s empires were the U.S.S.R. with a big empire across Central Asia, China controlling most of East Asia, and the United States with an empire made up of the fifty states. The collapse of the U.S.S.R. in the 1980s left China and the United States as the only big empires in the world today.

4 Comments

WHO WROTE THIS I NEED TO KNOW FOR MY SCHOOL PROJECT ABOUT DIFFERENT EMPIRES PLEASE COMMENT BACK AT LET ME KNOW THANKS!!!!!!

Karen Carr
May 9, 2018 at 4:22 pm

The citation info is right under the end of the article (above these comments). Here it is again:Carr, K.E. What is an empire? Definitions, examples. Quatr.us Study Guides, June 29, 2017. Web. May 9, 2018.

This is very poorly written and not at all accurate — like something a seventh grader would make up after looking at Wikipedia for two minutes. Get yourself a dictionary. Your definition of “empire” is just plain wrong. I really worry that students will come across a page like this on the internet and think it is scholarly.

Karen Carr
May 2, 2018 at 4:55 pm

Well, it’s pretty definitely scholarly, because I am actually a professional historian, with a doctorate and everything, and not a 7th grader. I’d be happy to consider changing anything you specifically demonstrate to be wrong, but it’s difficult to defend my article against your vague insults.

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